In Freudian psychoanalysis, a condensation (German: Verdichtung) is when a single idea (an image, memory, or thought) or dream object stands for several associations and ideas.

In dreams/symptoms/jokes[edit]

Freud considered that "dreams are brief, meagre and laconic in comparison with the range and wealth of the dream-thoughts." Images and chains of association have their emotional charges displaced from the originating ideas to the receiving one, where they merge and "condense" together.^[1] Thus for example a dream figure may resemble A, wear B's clothes and act like C, but nevertheless we know somehow that they are 'really' D - rather as with the composite photographs of Francis Galton.^[2] While condensation could serve the purposes of the dream censorship by disguising thoughts, Freud considered condensation as primarily the preferred mode of functioning of the unconscious Id.^[3]

Freud saw the same mechanism of condensation at work in phantasies and neurotic symptoms,^[4] as well as in parapraxis and jokes: he often cited as an instance Heine's quip about the rich man treating him 'famillionairily'.^[5]

In metaphor/metonymy[edit]

In the 1950s the concept was used by linguist Roman Jakobson in his influential article on metaphor and metonymy. Comparing the linguistic evidence to Freud's account of the dream-work, Jakobson saw symbolism as relating to metaphor, condensation, and displacement to metonymy.^[6] Jakobson's work encouraged Jacques Lacan to say that the unconscious is structured like a language.^[7]

See also[edit]

• Cathexis
• Complex (psychology)
• Dream interpretation
• Portmanteau
• Priming (psychology)
• Mental representation

References[edit]

Sources[edit]

• Alain de Mijolla (ed.). International Dictionary of Psychoanalysis, 1st vol.: "Condensation", Macmillan Reference Books, ISBN 0-02-865924-4